The Kremlin’s “Front-Line”: The Russian-Inspired Counteroffensive against the Ukraine’s Nuclear Forces
KYIV, Ukraine — After being encircled by Ukrainian forces, Russia pulled troops out Saturday from an eastern Ukrainian city that it had been using as a front-line hub. It was the latest victory for the Ukrainian counteroffensive that has humiliated and angered the Kremlin.
The Russian front line used to have an important link with Lyman. The region is in the southeastern part of Ukraine, close to the border with Luhansk region, which was also annexed by Russia on Friday.
Even without considering Russia’s veiled threats to use nuclear weapons in the war, these events put the ability of international organizations to prevent and contain the crisis under unprecedented stress. And, looking ahead, as nuclear energy is deployed around the world, Ukraine might not be the only location with power plants at risk from conflict.
A counteroffensive by the Ukrainian forces started in September and has resulted in the recapture of vast swaths of territory. They have pushed Russian forces out of the Kharkiv area and moved east across the Oskil River.
Ramzan Kadyrov blamed the retreat on a general who he said was covered up for by higher-up leaders in the General Staff. He called for “more drastic measures.”
An emergency situation at the airfield in the city of Sevastopol was announced by the governor. Huge billows of smoke could be seen from a distance by beachgoers in the Russian-held resort. Authorities said a plane rolled off the runway at the Belbek airfield and ammunition that was reportedly on board caught fire.
Russian bombardments have intensified in recent days as Moscow moved quickly with its annexation, and ordered a mass mobilizing of its forces at home. More than 100,000 Russians left the country after the Russian call-up was unpopular at home.
The president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and his military vowed to continue their fight to liberate the Russian-occupied areas.
The attack on a convoy of russian forces targeting a nuclear power plant in the Kharkiv region of the Kurdistan province
The governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, said 24 civilians were killed in an attack this week on a convoy trying to flee the Kupiansk district. He said that it couldn’t be justified. He said a pregnant woman and 13 children were dead.
Photographs of the attacked convoy were posted on the website of the Security Service of Ukraine. There were burned corpses in what was left of the truck bed, that appeared to have been blown up. Another vehicle at the front of the convoy also had been ablaze. There are bodies on the side of the road or inside vehicles, which were covered in bullet holes.
The majority of the 31 missiles targeted at Kyiv were shot down. The Ukrainians say they’ve been shooting down three-quarters of the incoming Russian missiles.
The head of the UN atomic watchdog is scheduled to visit Kyiv this week to discuss the situation after Putin signed a decree declaring that Russia was taking over the Zaporizhzhia facility. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry called it a criminal act and said it considered Putin’s decree “null and void.” The state nuclear operator, Energoatom, said it would continue to operate the plant.
Russia did not publicly comment on the report. Russia told the I Atomic Energy Agency that the director-general of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant was arrested to answer questions.
Nuclear power facilities have never been attacked by the enemy during war. As Russian armed forces pushed into Ukraine in February, troops took control of the Chernobyl nuclear exclusion zone, where hundreds of people still manage the aftermath of the catastrophic 1986 meltdown. Vehicles stirred up radioactive dust while moving towards Kyiv. The Russian soldiers were stationed near the abandoned city of Pripyat.
Jens Stoltenberg said that the largest attempt to annexation of European territory by force since the Second World War took place after Friday’s land grab.
Vladimir Putin meets Vladimir Putin: Towards a European High-Security Security Zone for the Boosting Security and Prosperity
More than $12.3 billion in military and economic aid was provided by the bill that President Joe Biden signed in Washington.
The strikes came just hours after Ukraine’s president announced that the country’s military had retaken three more villages in one of the regions illegally annexed by Russia.
A girl is in a hospital after she was rescued from the multi-story buildings, the Governor wrote on his Telegram channel.
One of the regions that Russia annexed on wednesday is Zaporizhzhia, with a nuclear plant under Russian control. The city of the same name remains under Ukrainian control.
He noted that the plant must be protected, and that he will travel to Russia and then back to Ukraine to agree on a nuclear safety and security zone around the plant. This is an absolute imperative that must be acted upon quickly.
A group of 40 heads of state from all over Europe are meeting in the Czech capital Thursday to create a European Political Community that is aimed at boosting security and prosperity.
During his conference call with reporters, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that certain territories will be reclaimed as well as the residents who would like to embrace Russia.
Putin has vowed to protect Russia’s territory with any means at his military’s disposal, including nuclear weapons, though the exact borders of the areas Moscow claims remain unclear.
In his nightly video address Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the Ukrainian army recaptured three more villages in the Kherson region. northeast of Kherson is where the other three Novovoskrysenske, Novohryhorivka, and Petropavlivka are located.
Military hospitals in Russia were full of wounded Russian soldiers and medics lacked supplies, said the deputy head of the Ukrainian regional government. Russian soldiers are being sent to the Black Sea region of Crimea once they are stable.
Russian troops left behind their dead brethren after they retreated so quickly from the city of Donetsk over the weekend. Some of them were lying down on the side of the road.
Lyman sustained heavy damage both during the occupation and as Ukrainian soldiers fought to retake it. Mykola, a 71-year-old man who gave only his first name, was among about 100 residents who lined up for aid on Wednesday.
Nuclear attack on Ukrainian energy infrastructure in Kamianske district: “We are focusing on preventing energy loss from disrupting a critical nuclear power plant in Ukraine,” Ukrenergo said
“We want the war to come to an end, the pharmacy and shops and hospitals to start working as they used to,” he said. “Now we don’t have anything yet. Everything has been destroyed and pillaged.
In his nightly address, a defiant Zelenskyy switched to speaking Russian to tell the Moscow leadership that it has already lost the war that it launched Feb. 24.
The UN’s nuclear watchdog condemned new shelling near Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which just disconnected the plant from Ukraine’s power grid, according to its operator.
The International Atomic Energy Agency Director General said that the resumed shelling was irresponsible.
Vladimir Rogov, a senior pro-Russian official, said the plant can be put back into operation.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine has restored some power, U.N. nuclear watchdog officials announced. It comes amid fears that total electricity loss would cause a nuclear accident.
The director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency said the restoration of power was a temporary relief.
Moscow carried out attacks on crucial energy facilities in three Ukrainian regions and disrupted power in some areas on Monday, Ukraine’s prime minister has said.
The attack on energy infrastructure in the Kamianske district caused “fire” and “destruction,” according to a regional military official.
” Currently, all services are working to eliminate the effects of shelling and restore electricity supply.” Shmyhal said that each region has a crisis response plan.
“We ask Ukrainians, in order to stabilize the energy system, to take a united and conscious approach to economical consumption of electricity. Especially during peak hours.”
Ukraine’s state energy supplier Ukrenergo said the power grid in the country remains “under control,” adding that repair crews are working to curb the consequences of the attacks.
After a week of deadly Russian strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure, Shmyhal made an announcement.
The document is clear and concise. It states that4: “attacks or threats of attack on nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful purposes have dangerous political, economic, human health, and environmental, implications and raise serious concerns regarding the application of international law, which could warrant appropriate action in accordance with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations”.
The integrity of reactor core and storage pools is the main concern. A core melt and uncontrollable release of radiation is possible, as happened at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania in 19792 if fuel rods are exposed. The energy minister ofUkraine warned that the generators would not be working if there was one mine or one missile.
The most urgent priority is the withdrawal of Russian military personnel and weapons from the Zaporizhzhia plant, and to ensure there are no further attacks on it or its power sources. The security of other Ukrainian plants must also be guaranteed. Following that, a more formal security and protection zone should be established through negotiations between the parties, ideally formalized in a Security Council resolution.
Security of Nuclear Power Plants in Armed Conflict Zones: Report of the Five-Year Review of the United Nations Nuclear Power Treaty
Globally, 57 units to supply 60 gigawatts (GW) of new nuclear power are under construction, mostly outside Europe3. By the year 2020, China will have 180 giga Watt of nuclear power, with 150 new entrants and a total cost of US $450 billion. India is building seven new nuclear power plants in addition to the 22 existing ones, while Bangladesh, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates are each building their first.
Turkey’s borders with Iraq and Syria have been highly unstable, complicated further by persistent conflict with its Kurdish minority and the extremist Islamist movement Daesh. Relations between India and Pakistan have been more stable since the 1999 ‘Kargil war’, but border fighting regularly breaks out. India–China relations are also tense, but a Ukraine scenario seems unlikely. The deployment of troops from the Chinese mainland to Taiwan will be the most worrying situation at the moment.
Also needed are wide-ranging and interdisciplinary risk assessments that consider the interactions between existing and future nuclear builds, the risks of conflict, specific site vulnerabilities, and potential loss of life and land from radiation release. Some limited studies have been done but they are classified, and scholars will need to be given access and the information shared internationally. It requires investment by industry and the government. Regulators and governments would be encouraged to take action.
The five-year review conference of the treaty was fractured by division and ended in a stand-off. The treaty was not strengthened by considering the safety and security of nuclear-power plants in armed conflict zones, for the first time, as a result of Russia blocking the adoption of a draft outcome document.
There is a ban on attacks on military objectives located in the vicinity of nuclear power stations. This prohibits military attacks on installations containing dangerous forces if they cause the release of dangerous forces and cause severe losses to the civilian population.
The get-out clause is in the protocol. It permits strikes on “other military objectives located at or in the vicinity of these works or installations only if they are used in regular, significant and direct support of military operations and if such attack is the only feasible way to terminate such support”.
Demilitarization of the site, subject to a UN Security Council resolution, would be uncontroversial. But how could such a situation be monitored and secured? A small, neutral international peacekeeping force tasked with supporting the IAEA’s mission there is one option. If the attacks continue, they may have to face the need to suppress troop incursions or rockets at the site. This would require rapid access to air power and poses a lot of risks.
Russia has a veto on the Security Council and it would be difficult to get a resolution. A resolution should be pursued. Negotiations over ceasefires, withdrawals and peacekeeping forces often run in tandem. A well designed deployment can put moral and strategic pressure on the enemy.
Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03580-0
Nuclear Safety in Ukraine: Russian Airstrikes and the “Kubo”-Kuzbo Nuclear Power Strikes
The research into making nuclear plants safer should be done by non-partisan organizations, scholars, the civilian nuclear industry and the IAEA.
It’s necessary for a new reactor, fuel-storage and site designs to be designed to cope with terrorist and armed attacks. A 2006 report from the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine — commissioned by Congress after the 9/11 Commission discovered that al-Qaeda had considered crashing planes into US nuclear plants — recommended improved fuel-pool designs and prompt transfer of fuel to dry storage after five years6. It didn’t consider the danger of a military attack. Industry resisted the recommendations because of their cost, and similar analysis for nuclear plants outside the United States is sparse.
Russia, Ukrainians and eastern Europe will be lucky if the war in Ukraine does not end in disaster. The world should be ashamed that, nearly 70 years after US President Dwight D. Eisenhower proclaimed the era of ‘atoms for peace’, people are depending on luck. The world’s governments have the power to prevent disasters. Will they do something?
KYIV, Ukraine — Russian airstrikes on Ukrainian cities Wednesday knocked out power and water service and caused at least six civilian deaths in the latest assault on the country’s struggling energy grid, Ukrainian authorities said.
Also, Ukraine intentionally disconnected three nuclear power plants from the national electricity grid as a precautionary measure in response to the Russian strikes, the energy company Ukrenergo said.
One of the capital’s infrastructure facilities has been hit, according to the mayor. He said that a teenager was among those killed in the shelling of the city.
“More cruel missile strikes across the country as Russia tries to punish Ukraine for daring to be free,” the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, said in a tweet. Russia is attempting to dominate Ukraine by plunging it into the cold.
The tragedy of the Russian attacks in Ukraine: a warning to protect civilians from the nuclear power grid and the survival of the country’s nuclear reactor
The company said that the nuclear reactor have been turned on but still not reconnected to the national grid after a brief emergency shutdown.
In the west of the country, one regional administrator, Serhii Hamalii, said on Telegram that most of the surrounding area was without power and water due to the Russian attacks. The Khmelnytskyi nuclear power station was taken offline.
Vitaliy Kim, the military administrator in the southern region of Mykolaiv, told reporters that the nuclear plant had been cut from the grid leading to a risky shutdown of the reactor there.
The nation’s power system has a significant deficit caused by months of strikes, triggering limits on consumption, the operator said. Ukrainian authorities are engaged in the delicate work of trying to balance the national power grid, leaving many households without electricity.
In Moldova, President Maia Sandu wrote this about Russia on Facebook: “We can’t trust a regime that leaves us in the dark and cold, that purposely kills people for the mere desire to keep other peoples poor and humble.”
Preparing for the winter is something thatUkrainians are racing to do. In a Tuesday night video address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said there are now 4,000 centers to take care of civilians if there are extended power cuts.
Putin’s comments on the attacks on energy infrastructure: What do we know about them? And what does it teach us about the Kremlin?
He called them “points of invincibility,” saying they will provide heat, water, phone charging and internet access. Many will be in schools and government buildings.
The Russian president made comments specifically addressing the Russian military attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure at a reception at the Kremlin.
Speaking after an awards ceremony for “Heroes of Russia,” he addressed the group of soldiers receiving the awards. He said of the attacks, “yes, we are doing it. But who started it?”
The truck that exploded on the strategic crossing on October 8th was mentioned in his comments. The Kremlin accused the Ukrainians of being responsible after they never claimed it was theirs.
Last week Putin appeared on the Kerch Bridge, where he was shown repairs and drove a car across the structure that he himself officially opened in 2018.
He ended his apparently off-the-cuff comments by saying that people don’t mention the water problem because they don’t want to offend anyone. No one has said a word about it. At all! Complete silence.”
The Russian president tersely compared the difference in reactions to attacks on Russia and attacks on Ukraine, saying, “as soon as we make a move, do something in response – noise, clamor, crackle for the whole universe.”
He concluded the speech by adding that “it won’t interfere with our combat missions,” before raising a toast to the listening soldiers and sipping from his champagne glass.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/09/europe/putin-ukrainian-infrastructure-strikes-intl/index.html
Why the Ukrainian energy grid is so big that it feels like a major inland region: When Soviet power went too far, and why Ukraine needed to be independent
The pace of restoration is slowed by difficult weather conditions, with the damage done due to the freezing and dissolution of wires in distribution networks.
A top Ukrainian official said the attacks on the country’s energy grid amount to genocide. The Ukrainian prosecutor-general spoke to the BBC last month.
Yuriy Samoilenko was the chief environmental inspector at Kyiv’s city hall at the time of the Chernobyl meltdown. He says he knew there were some risks associated with nuclear energy, but felt misled by the government in Moscow about the scope of the blasts. After all, the power plant is just 60 miles north of Ukraine’s biggest population center.
After years of atomic energy powering big Russian cities like Moscow, Leningrad and Voronezh, the USSR was finally ready to expand the technology to other Soviet republics like Ukraine. It was claimed that the Soviet propaganda would make jobs and air cleaner.
She heard from friends and relatives who worked at the Chernobyl plant that authorities would cut corners and pump up power production for the USSR to export to other Eastern bloc countries.
Ukraine was looked at like an inland area. As far as nuclear power went, Ukrainians were not trusted, says David Marples, a historian at Canada’s University ofAlberta and author of multiple books about Chernobyl.
I did not understand why we needed to be independent. I knew that we’re deserving of dignity just as much as Russians.
A group of environmental scientists formed a organization called Green World. Behind closed doors, the group behind the youth environmental movement pushed for the independence of Ukranian.
Everybody has to be involved in protecting the things that affect everybody, that’s the only way to protect the environment.
Evading the Chernobyl zone: The survival of a village in the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant
Sophia Arkadiyivna is now retired as mayor of her hometown of Kupovate. Ukraine’s government erased the village from the map in 1999. That’s because it’s in the 60-mile-wide “exclusion zone,” which was deemed too dangerous for the public after the Chernobyl disaster.
She came back despite the environmental risks after she retired as a school teacher. She returned to her abandoned house because the government turned a blind eye to her. She spends most of her days alone and tending to her garden.
She speaks Ukrainian, with a few Belarusian words peppered in. The village is close to the border with Belarus, rather than the former Chernobyl plant. She used to think that there wasn’t much difference between Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians.
“Us old folks raised our kids to believe in God: Don’t steal, don’t kill, don’t bother anyone, live virtuously, have a soul, help people,” she says while angrily chopping vegetables to pickle for the winter.
Hundreds of other retirees like her lived through the Russian occupation of the exclusion zone in March, as did thousands of Ukrainian officials and workers who continue to maintain the vital power infrastructure that passes through the zone.
The safety chief in the exclusion zone says the Russians stole radios, tires and batteries from his entire fleet of vehicles. Many had smashed windows or bullet holes in the doors.
Instead of working on necessary tasks around the zone, Havrylenko and his team are still cleaning up after the Russian occupation. Having survived the month-long occupation, though, they can hardly imagine the stress that people working at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant are under.
“I’m very, very scared,” says Serhiy Biruk, a top official with the Ukrainian agency that manages the exclusion zone. He’s been involved in the Chernobyl cleanup for 37 years.
The Ukrainian power utility says that the Russian government forced nuclear workers to sign new contracts acknowledging their control over the power plant.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/12/11/1138382531/ukraine-fears-nuclear-disaster-zaporizhzhia-chernobyl-memories
The Impact of Off-Grid Utilities on the Local Economy and the Sustainable Development of the Energy Economy: Report of Arkadiyivna
The people want their energy production to be more local. They’re looking to the lifestyles of people like Arkadiyivna, relying on off-grid utilities like batteries and solar panels to survive.